Just as there is no agreed phrase to describe the talks, the peace process also lacks a mutually agreed agenda, timeframe and means for engagement. It has only begun establishing a framework and ground rules. Constantly changing, neither side has fully committed to the few parameters already in place. A senior government securi-ty official described “a very flexible process”, less a plan than an avalanche of ad hoc initiatives.18 A top Turkish analyst saw it as “more of a negotiation … a way for the two strongmen, Erdoğan and Öcalan, to keep the process under control”.19 For some, the strategy for both sides is just establishing a holding pattern to gain time.20
Neither side knows when or where the process will end, so both are feeling their way forward. Turkish and PKK participants appear to have no carefully designed or detailed long-term strategy, but rather respond to necessity and practical considera-tions as they arise. A senior Turkish security official said that even if the government made the perfect plan, it would be impossible to map it on to the shifting sands of Turkish politics.21 President Erdoğan may have been reluctant to set up a proper pro-cess because it is politically risky. Turkish scepticism about the need for compromise means that even becoming “the leader who resolved the Kurdish problem” may offer little electoral benefit.22
16 “I tell the PKK they have unrealistic expectations [about how fast the AKP government can move]”.
Crisis Group interview, senior Turkish security official, Ankara, June 2014.
17 “I was in jail in Turkey for more than twenty years, and then they made me do my military service too, which was like being in an open prison. And [thanks to media and visitors] I still feel like I’m in Turkey”. Crisis Group interview, Sabri Ok, exiled PKK/KCK leader, Qandil, Iraq, July 2014.
18 Crisis Group interview, Ankara, February 2014.
19 Interview with Bülent Aras, “Davutoğlu ekibini dinler ama ikna eşiği yüksektir”, Radikal, 27 Au-gust 2014.
20 “I don’t believe in it. They keep announcing that the next reform package will have the roadmap, and then when it comes, it’s just one miniscule incremental step”. Crisis Group interview, Western diplomat, Istanbul, September 2014.
21 Crisis Group interview, Ankara, June 2014.
22 Crisis Group interview, European diplomat, Ankara, June 2014.
An initial roadmap, according to both sides, entailed a three-stage process. Un-fortunately, timing of mutual steps in the first and second phases triggered disa-greement. According to the government, the PKK should have initiated a ceasefire and withdrawn all its forces outside Turkey, leaving its weapons behind.23 Then the government would take democratisation steps, followed by total disarmament and demobilisation of the PKK.24 But the PKK expected the government to make legal and constitutional reforms, and take steps such as allowing evicted Kurds to return to their native villages, at the same time as the PKK declared a ceasefire, released hos-tages and withdrew armed insurgents.25 Citing inaction on government promises, the PKK suspended its withdrawals in early September 2013.26
Despite the confusion, the peace process has begun to displace deep-rooted mis-trust between the PKK and the Turkish government, revealing a new readiness to re-sist provocations. Following Öcalan’s letter read out at the Nowrouz celebrations in Diyarbakır on 21 March 2013, the PKK declared a unilateral ceasefire, its ninth since 1993. Öcalan said it was “time for weapons to be silenced and for politics and ideas to speak”, and called on armed elements to withdraw from Turkish territory.27 In March, the PKK also handed over kidnapped Turkish public workers to a delegation that included pro-Kurdish politicians.
The PKK ceasefire has been matched by an apparent Turkish government readi-ness to keep the armed forces from attacking PKK targets. AKP’s ability to do busi-ness with the PKK has prompted voices close to the security forces to criticise the government for compromising the state’s monopoly on the legitimate use of force.28 AKP had already significantly curbed the Turkish armed forces’ autonomy by abol-ishing the Protocol on Cooperation for Security and Public Order (Emniyet Asayiş Yardımlaşma protokolü, EMASYA) that authorised the military to intervene at will in public events where it saw a risk of terrorism. Any military action now requires the government-appointed provincial or district governors’ approval. But, if passed, a recent draft law that gives the police increased powers (including making it easier to search people and vehicles, allowing longer detention times) and expands the scope of terrorism and violent crimes and crimes against the government, risks overturning these gains.
23 “The package offered by the government was completely unbalanced. It couldn’t be done that way. … The sequence as announced was disarmament before an agreement …. Disarmament, de-mobilisation and reintegration (DDRs) should be confidential. And you’d struggle to find any con-flict where disarmament or DDR preceded an agreement …. The roadmap with Öcalan didn’t work, because it was front-loaded for the government”. Crisis Group telephone interview, former UN con-flict mediator, Istanbul, October 2014.
24 Crisis Group interviews, Ankara and Istanbul, June-July 2014.
25 Crisis Group interview, Sabri Ok, PKK/KCK leader, Qandil, Iraq, July 2014.
26 Öcalan said, “If [the government] does not [take steps], there can be no withdrawals”. “İşte İmralı’daki görüşmenin tutanakları” [“Minutes of the meeting in İmralı”], Milliyet, 5 March 2013.
27 For more, see Didem Collinsworth, “Öcalan announcement raises hopes for Turkey peace”, Crisis Group blog (blog.crisisgroup.org), 22 March 2013.
28 “Police and soldiers have been constrained to their outposts. Land forces cannot carry out any operations in the region. What you call ‘clashes’ are when the PKK blocks roads, fires rockets from afar. Once in a while the police and gendarmerie go and check out these incidents. Police, gendar-merie and soldiers are all low on morale”. Crisis Group interview, Haldun Solmaztürk, retired brig-adier general, Ankara, June 2014. “The AKP has handed over to the PKK the security environment established by the state in the past twenty years. … It should have continued negotiations while maintaining a tight security environment. Now the cost of reestablishing it will be too high”. Crisis Group interview, Nihat Ali Özcan, PKK expert, Ankara, June 2014.
A PKK/KCK confidence-building measure – the withdrawal of armed elements to outside Turkish borders that began in May and ended in September 2013 – was car-ried out without a formal agreement, framework or monitoring mechanism. This was a concession from the PKK/KCK, considering that during the 1999 withdrawals, Turkish security forces attacked retreating militants, inflicting a death toll in the several hundreds. Some PKK cadres had openly criticised Öcalan for surrendering territory.29
A 30 September 2013 democratisation package by the AKP legalised education in mother languages in private schools; removed the morning pledge of allegiance, which Kurds felt was discriminatory; gave state aid to political parties that receive at least 3 per cent of the national vote (thus to pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party/
People’s Democratic Party, BDP/HDP); lifted the ban on election propaganda in lan-guages other than Turkish; allowed reinstatement of (mostly Kurdish) names for vil-lages and towns; and formalised the possibility of two co-chairs for political parties (a practice currently carried out only by pro-Kurdish parties). Nonetheless, the PKK/
KCK leadership believed the AKP had only addressed some of its concerns, and saw the reforms as a stalling tactic and an electoral calculation rather than a genuine effort to answer Kurdish democratic demands.30
The government has also released thousands of Kurdish activists charged with PKK/
KCK membership and detained for years at the stage of criminal investigation or dur-ing their trials, despite scant evidence of involvement in violent activities. This most-ly happened after a March 2014 legal reform package shortened pre-trial detention time from ten to five years.31 Initiatives were put in place to release some sick pris-oners. The Kurdish national movement recognises these changes but wants more:
“Reforms always had sub-articles that made them pointless, like prosecutors being able to choose which sick prisoners to release. [But] a lot has changed [since the 1990s]. We used to get killed then, now we get arrested”.32
Both sides should do more to build trust, particularly by exploring more trans-parent public approaches to the end goals of the process and the framework in which these goals can be reached (see Section III below). Given the controversy over re-sponsibility for the breakdown of past ceasefires, notably in 2011, they should agree
29 Top PKK commander Murat Karayılan called the 1999 experience “a painful” one, saying that withdrawals do not necessarily contribute to a solution. “Gerilla sınır dışına çekilmiyor” [“The guer-rillas are not withdrawing to outside borders”], Fırat News Agency, 9 November 2010. Another top cadre, Fehman Hüseyin (aka Bahoz Erdal), drew attention to the significance of the 2013 withdraw-al decision: “Our leadership [Öcwithdraw-alan] decided on a politicwithdraw-al move …. We are hopeful about peace but not because we trust the state. We trust our leadership’s foresight”. Interview with Hasan Cemal,
“Bahoz Erdal: Bugün silahı bir kenara koyuyoruz, ama bu silahı bırakmak demek değil!” [“We are putting weapons aside today but that does not mean disarmament”], T24 web portal (Turkey), 14 May 2014.
30 A KCK statement said, “It is evident that the motivation behind this package is to gain votes and win another election. … No approach or policy that does not recognise Kurds as a society, does not accept their rights … and does not take their political will as a counterparty can solve the Kurdish issue”. “KCK: AKP’nin Politikası Çözüm Değil Çözümsüzlük” [“KCK: AKP’s policy is one of non-solution”], bianet.org, 1 October 2013. Crisis Group interview, People’s Democratic Party (HDP) member of parliament involved in the process, Ankara, June 2014
31 Crisis Group interview, Emma Sinclair-Webb, senior Turkey researcher, Human Rights Watch, Istanbul, July 2014
32 Crisis Group interview, pro-Kurdish newspaper correspondent, Diyarbakır, June 2014.
on what actions are considered violations and how to deal with them, as well as clear and viable verification and control systems.